(Bogota) The United States and the UN announced on Monday that they would support the transformation of the Colombian police wanted by the new left-wing president Gustavo Petro, who wants to make it more respectful of human rights.
Posted yesterday at 8:34 p.m.
This project provides for the creation of an observatory to “prevent human rights violations” and compulsory courses for agents on “the use of force”, declared during a presentation in Bogota the new director of the police , General Henry Sanabria.
Washington will provide $10 million to support this initiative and “strengthen police knowledge of best human rights practices […] and improve community confidence,” said Todd D. Robinson, White House Undersecretary for International Drug Affairs.
During the same presentation, the representative in Colombia of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Juan Carlos Monge announced that the United Nations would also participate in the program. He wanted the Colombian police to apply “international standards in the use of force and firearms”.
In Colombia, the police depend on the Ministry of Defense and actively participate in the fight against drug trafficking and against the various armed groups that operate in the country.
She is often criticized by human rights organizations for her violence, including during the 2021 anti-government protests in which 28 civilians were killed by security forces, according to the UN.
Mr. Petro, a former guerrilla who became Colombia’s first left-wing president in early August, changed the top police and army officials upon his arrival. He wants to detach the police from the Ministry of Defense to place it under the authority of a new “Ministry of Peace, Security and Cohabitation”.
The new president’s project is “a first step” towards “structural change”, welcomed during Monday’s presentation the city councilor of Bogota Diego Cancino, who in 2020 had denounced the death of nine people in a fire in a police station, probably due to the negligence of the police.
“It’s a step for the police to stop being so endogamous and recognize that they need to transform,” he added.